When The Sun Goes Down
Los Chicharrons
(Voodoo Recordings)
Reported Saturday, September 13 2003
Courtesy of Jonty_Adderley @ www.skrufff.com
'People associate voodoo with darkness and Satan but that's just what they tell you as a kid. It's a culture for people; it helps you to get a job or to get a girl, or make sure she loves you; that kind of thing.'
Ramon Santana clearly knows a thing or two about magic and judging by Los Chicharrons's new and third album When The Sun Goes Down, he's not afraid to use it. Combining Latin tinge blues ballads with seductively funky, hip hop tinged diabolic fusions, the Brooklyn raised veteran producer evokes New Orleans and Haiti as much as Hoxton, the uber-fashionable London quarter he's more recently made his spiritual home.
Helping out on the music is Ramon's Danish partner-in-crime Morten Hansen, laying down deeply funky, old skool disco style grooves on tracks like Walkin Talkin' that echo Grace Jones during her late 70s peak. Talitas Lament is similarly late 70s in vibe, it's mournful Spanish guitar lead accompanying a John Carpenter-esque keyboard melody.
Part two of the album picks up in tempo, reflecting the Latino street grooves that Ramon undoubtedly absorbed from his New York days, conga drums and walking basslines permeating party tunes like Me Voy 'Con La Conga' and Mano Dura.
"People sometimes get touchy about the subject of voodoo and ask me 'You're not dealing with the occult are you?' Ramon told Skrufff in a previous interview.
I say No, though I love the imagery. Our label is called Voodoo Recordings and I recently got a new tattoo saying 'Voodoo Love' (in Spanish).".
When The Sun Goes Down is out on September 6 on Voodoo Recordings.
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